(Bloomberg) -- Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook and Alphabet Inc.'s Sundar Pichai will deliver public speeches to help launch China's World Internet Conference in Wuzhen, a controversial event designed to globalize the country's vision of a censored web.
Cook and Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. Chairman Jack Ma will speak at the opening ceremony, while Pichai will take part in a panel discussion about driving the digital economy. Other leading technology executives taking part include Cisco Systems Inc.'s Chuck Robbins, Tencent Holdings Ltd.'s Pony Ma and Baidu Inc. founder Robin Li.
The annual event, organised by censorship tsar Xu Lin and the Cyberspace Administration of China, was founded in 2014. It promotes the country's favored concept of a more centrally controlled internet.
Cook and Pichai's participation at the conference comes as Chinese internet users face the fiercest crackdown on open communications in recent memory. This includes measures that all but eliminate the ability to post social media anonymously, make app store owners responsible for how customers use their purchases and require online portals to stop news reporting.
In November, Microsoft Corp.'s Skype phone and video service became the latest victim of the crackdown when its app was removed from several popular platforms including Apple's App Store.
To contact the reporter on this story: David Ramli in Beijing at dramli1@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Stanley James at sjames8@bloomberg.net, John McCluskey, Keith Gosman
©2017 Bloomberg L.P.
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